A bath is more than just a functional item, it can make a real design splash too

There are few things as decadent as a really spectacular bath. At the foot of the bed, in a big picture window or simply in the middle of the bathroom. We've searched the archive for the most show-stopping baths seen on the pages of House & Garden.

 

 

Curtains in Robert Kime's floral linen ‘Rocca’ frames a bath from Drummonds in this glorious Georgian house decorated by Joanna Plant. Joanna adapted the house to cater for the modern need for a bathroom with every bedroom by placing a freestanding tub under the triptych bay window in the best spare room, and sneaking a tiny basin and lavatory behind a jib door.

 

PAUL MASSEY

 

At Ballyfin, a grand Irish house transformed into a country hotel, one bathroom has as its bath a Roman sarcophagus acquired in 1822.

 

SIMON BROWN

 

The main bathroom at Bowood – a quintessential English country house – features a chintz-covered free-standing bathtub. It is a large-scale lilac chintz from Colefax & Fowler, which has since been discontinued, and which appears on the walls and curtains too.

 

SIMON UPTON

 

The owners of this London house called on interior designer Beata Heuman to create a family home full of fun, distinctive design and punchy colours. The opulent, free-standing bath was copied from a Twenties design that Beata spotted in an old magazine. 'It was quite difficult to work out how to make it. Fortunately, we had a very good joiner and we discovered a specialist timber from the Netherlands that is used in boat building and can be submerged in water for 10 years without any ill effect.'

 

RACHEL WHITING

 

A gleaming copper bath grabs your attention in the en suite bathroom of Jeremy Langmead's house, decorated by Susan Deliss. The potential coldness of the metal is balanced by soft decorating; a carpet underfoot and patterned wallpaper.

 

OWEN GALE

 

A cast-iron Aston Matthews ‘Epoca’ bath, its sides painted in Emente’s ‘Orpiment’, provides a colourful contrast with Robert Kime’s ‘Grille Sage’ wallpaper and muted panelling in this bathroom by Ben Pentreath.

 

PAUL MASSEY

 

With a characteristic respect for the fabric of this eighteenth-century house in Bath, designer Patrick Williams has carefully transformed it into a welcoming home and B&B. During the restoration the owners enriched the house with all sorts of additions that look as though they have always been there - a corner cupboard on a landing or pilasters in the family bathroom, for instance. When the project started, Patrick spoke to several reclamation yards asking them to put aside any suitable elements for a Georgian house. He also trawled Ebay. Jig Baths offers a similar round tub to the one used here.

 

MICHAEL SINCLAIR

 

At Atelier Vime's hôtel particulier an alcove framed in pale blue contains a slipper bath backed by original eighteenth-century wallpaper.

 

ANDREW MONTGOMERY

 

In the bathroom of this Sussex cottage desgined by Beata Heuman, pale Arabescata marble has been used for the elegant bath surround and splashback instead of tiles. The placement of the bath into the middle of the room makes the bath the focal point of the room.

 

PAUL MASSEY

 

Paint & Paper Library’s ‘Squid Ink’ paint was used on the Aston Matthews roll-top bath, beside panelling in ‘Salvador’ oil eggshell by the same company in Robin Muir's Cotswolds bathroom. The inky tones create an elegant and cocooning effect.

 

 

This Georgian house, once inhabited by Huguenot silk weavers, has been carefully restored by architect Chris Dyson. In the bathroom a slipper bath stands on a Carrara-marble plinth.

 

 

Veere Grenney used a vintage copper free-standing tub from The Water Monopoly in a bathroom of a Mustique beach house.

 

DAVID OLIVER

 

The bath in a Cotswolds house by Joanna Wood is a particularly curvaceous one that looks instantly inviting. It sits upon a Calacatta Vagli marble floor by Mander & Germain, which adds to the grandeur of the space.

 

SIMON BROWN

 

At this fashion designer's sensitively restored Georgian house a vintage solid walnut Eames ‘Stool C’ echoes the curves of a ‘Paris’ bath from The Water Monopoly.

 

CAMERA PRESS

 

At Inchyra House in Scotland an elegant bathroom features taupe curtains, a matching claw-foot bathtub and a view to the garden.

 

 

Henriette Von Stockhausen has restored this wonderful 19th Century house with beautiful fabrics and attention to detail. In the bathroom the rolltop bath was sourced from The Water Monopoly.

 

PAUL MASSEY

 

A mother-and-daughter design duo has taken an unconventional approach to the conversion of a sixteenth-century convent in Tuscany, filling the rooms with objects and artworks of their own making. In this bathroom Venetia painted an abstract watery cloudscape on the ceiling of one of the bathrooms and a trompe l'oeil design behind the bath; the ceramic lion’s-paw feet for the bath were made by Holly.